Get your therapy at a cellular level from a duo of Stanford postdocs, resuscitate your zest for life with an ER doc and end-of-life protocols expert, and reflect on some space magic with an astrophysicist who also critiques Star Trek science. Drinking will be involved, as will ingestion of bao and bopping to some beats. You know, just a typical mid-July nite at the Rickshaw. Be there and be square!

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“Fighting Cancer from Within: Are We Ready for Cancer Immunotherapy?” by Saumyaa and Rachel Lynn

We all know the drill. A devastating cancer diagnosis, followed by months or years of chemo and radiation. These treatments can and do save lives, yet in the process unleash powerful toxic agents on an already frail and embattled human body. But what if there was another way? Cancer immunotherapy is an exciting new approach that harnesses the power of your own immune system to attack cancer cells. And like all things that seem too good to be true, there may be more than meets the eye. Would you know which to choose? And is there one right answer?

“Written in Ink: Tattoos and Best Practices in Medical Directives” by Derek Kuhl Richardson

You see a man collapse at a concert; before you start CPR, you see he has a tattoo reading “DNR” across his chest. Do you assume this means “do not resuscitate” and respect his wishes for a peaceful death? Or might he simply be a zealous fan of groundbreaking German synth band Das Nacht Reinhold and want full medical care?

Derek is an ER doctor, an assistant professor of emergency medicine at UCSF, and a researcher in communications of end-of-life goals of care. He has an unambiguous Neutral Milk Hotel chest tattoo.

With the Hubble Space Telescope, we can find galaxies so far away that the light left them when the universe was in its infancy. This gives us a glimpse of some of the first sources to light up the universe, but it’s incredibly difficult as these most distant galaxies are so small and faint. To overcome this difficulty, we use an amazing quirk of general relativity that causes dark matter to act as a natural telescope in space, magnifying these very distant galaxies to make them bright enough to see. If this sounds like magic, that’s because it is.

Rachael received her PhD in astrophysics from Durham University in England and now works at University of Melbourne in Australia. Her research focuses on the most distant galaxies in the universe.